WHEN   A   MAN 
COMES  TO   HIMSELF 


BJ 

1581 

«76 


WHEN   A   MAN   COMES 
TO   HIMSELF 


BOOKS  BY 
WOODROW   WILSON 

A  HISTORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  PEOPLE 
Profusely  illustrated.    5  volumes.     8vo 
Three-quarter  Calf 
Three-quarter  Levant 

GEORGE  WASHINGTON.    Illustrated.    8vo 
Popular  Edition 

WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF.     16mo 


HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  NEW  YORK 


WHEN  A  MAN 
COMES  TO  HIMSELF 


WOODROW    WILSON 

PH.D.,  LITT.D.,  EE.D. 
PRESIDENT  OP  THE  UNITED  STATES 


HARPER   fef   BROTHERS 

NEW    YORK     AND     LONDON 

M          C     •     M     •     X     •     V 


PRINTED  IN  THE   UNITED   STATES   OF  AMERICA 
PUBLISHED    MARCH.    1915 


WHEN   A   MAN   COMES 
TO   HIMSELF 


WHEN  A  MAN 
COMES   TO   HIMSELF 


IT  is  a  very  wholesome  and  re- 
generating change  which  a  man 
undergoes  when  he  "comes  to  him- 
self." It  is  not  only  after  peri- 
ods of  recklessness  or  infatuation, 
when  he  has  played  the  spendthrift 
or  the  fool,  that  a  man  comes  to  him- 
self. He  comes  to  himself  after  ex- 
periences of  which  he  alone  may  be 
aware:  when  he  has  left  off  being 
wholly  preoccupied  with  his  own 
HI 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

powers  and  interests  and  with  every 
petty  plan  that  centers  in  himself; 
when  he  has  cleared  his  eyes  to  see 
the  world  as  it  is,  and  his  own  true 
place  and  function  in  it. 

It  is  a  process  of  disillusionment. 
The  scales  have  fallen  away.  He 
sees  himself  soberly,  and  knows  un- 
der what  conditions  his  powers  must 
act,  as  well  as  what  his  powers  are. 
He  has  got  rid  of  earlier  preposses- 
sions about  the  world  of  men  and 
affairs,  both  those  which  were  too 
favorable  and  those  which  were  too 
unfavorable  —  both  those  of  the 
nursery  and  those  of  a  young  man's 
reading.  He  has  learned  his  own 
paces,  or,  at  any  rate,  is  in  a  fair 
way  to  learn  them;  has  found  his 
footing  and  the  true  nature  of  the 
"going"  he  must  look  for  in  the 

[2] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

world;  over  what  sorts  of  roads  he 
must  expect  to  make  his  running, 
and  at  what  expenditure  of  effort; 
whither  his  goal  lies,  and  what 
cheer  he  may  expect  by  the  way. 
It  is  a  process  of  disillusionment, 
but  it  disheartens  no  soundly  made 
man.  It  brings  him  into  a  light 
which  guides  instead  of  deceiving 
him;  a  light  which  does  not  make 
the  way  look  cold  to  any  man  whose 
eyes  are  fit  for  use  in  the  open,  but 
which  shines  wholesomely,  rather 
upon  the  obvious  path,  like  the 
honest  rays  of  the  frank  sun,  and 
makes  traveling  both  safe  and  cheer- 
ful. 

II 

There  is  no  fixed  time  in  a  man's 
life  at  which  he  comes  to  himself,  and 

[3] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

some  men  never  come  to  themselves 
at  all.  It  is  a  change  reserved 
for  the  thoroughly  sane  and  healthy, 
and  for  those  who  can  detach  them- 
selves from  tasks  and  drudgery  long 
and  often  enough  to  get,  at  any 
rate  once  and  again,  a  view  of  the 
proportions  of  life  and  of  the  stage 
and  plot  of  its  action.  We  speak 
often  with  amusement,  sometimes 
with  distaste  and  uneasiness,  of  men 
who  "  have  no  sense  of  humor," 
who  take  themselves  too  seriously, 
who  are  intense,  self-absorbed, 
over-confident  in  matters  of  opin- 
ion, or  else  go  plumed  with  conceit, 
proud  of  we  cannot  tell  what,  en- 
joying, appreciating,  thinking  of 
nothing  so  much  as  themselves. 
These  are  men  who  have  not  suf- 
fered that  wholesome  change.  They 

[4] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

have  not  come  to  themselves.  If 
they  be  serious  men,  and  real  forces 
in  the  world,  we  may  conclude  that 
they  have  been  too  much  and  too 
long  absorbed;  that  their  tasks  and 
responsibilities  long  ago  rose  about 
them  like  a  flood,  and  have  kept 
them  swimming  with  sturdy  stroke 
the  years  through,  their  eyes  level 
with  the  troubled  surface — no  hori- 
zon in  sight,  no  passing  fleets,  no 
comrades  but  those  who  struggled 
in  the  flood  like  themselves.  If  they 
be  frivolous,  light-headed,  men  with- 
out purpose  or  achievement,  we  may 
conjecture,  if  we  do  not  know,  that 
they  were  born  so,  or  spoiled  by 
fortune,  or  befuddled  by  self-in- 
dulgence. It  is  no  great  matter 
what  we  think  of  them. 
It  is  enough  to  know  that  there 

[5] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

are  some  laws  which  govern  a  man's 
awakening  to  know  himself  and  the 
right  part  to  play.  A  man  is  the 
part  he  plays  among  his  fellows.  He 
is  not  isolated;  he  cannot  be.  His 
life  is  made  up  of  the  relations  he 
bears  to  others — is  made  or  marred 
by  those  relations,  guided  by  them, 
judged  by  them,  expressed  in  them. 
There  is  nothing  else  upon  which  he 
can  spend  his  spirit — nothing  else 
that  we  can  see.  It  is  by  these  he 
gets  his  spiritual  growth;  it  is  by 
these  we  see  his  character  revealed, 
his  purpose,  and  his  gifts.  Some 
play  with  a  certain  natural  passion, 
an  unstudied  directness,  without 
grace,  without  modulation,  with  no 
study  of  the  masters  or  conscious- 
ness of  the  pervading  spirit  of  the 
plot;  others  give  all  their  thought 
[6] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

to  their  costume  and  think  only  of 
the  audience;  a  few  act  as  those 
who  have  mastered  the  secrets  of 
a  serious  art,  with  deliberate  sub- 
ordination of  themselves  to  the 
great  end  and  motive  of  the  play, 
spending  themselves  like  good  ser- 
vants, indulging  no  wilfulness,  ob- 
truding no  eccentricity,  lending 
heart  and  tone  and  gesture  to  the 
perfect  progress  of  the  action.  These 
have  "found  themselves,"  and  have 
all  the  ease  of  a  perfect  adjustment. 
Adjustment  is  exactly  what  a  man 
gains  when  he  comes  to  himself. 
Some  men  gain  it  late,  some  early; 
some  get  it  all  at  once,  as  if  by  one 
distinct  act  of  deliberate  accommo- 
dation; others  get  it  by  degrees  and 
quite  imperceptibly.  No  doubt  to 
most  men  it  comes  by  the  slow  proc- 

[7] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

esses  of  experience — at  each  stage 
of  life  a  little.  A  college  man  feels 
the  first  shock  of  it  at  graduation, 
when  the  boy's  life  has  been  lived 
out  and  the  man's  life  suddenly  be- 
gins. He  has  measured  himself  with 
boys;  he  knows  their  code  and  feels 
the  spur  of  their  ideals  of  achieve- 
ment. But  what  the  world  ex- 
pects of  him  he  has  yet  to  find  out, 
and  it  works,  when  he  has  discov- 
ered it,  a  veritable  revolution  in  his 
ways  both  of  thought  and  of  action. 
He  finds  a  new  sort  of  fitness  de- 
manded of  him,  executive,  thorough- 
going, careful  of  details,  full  of 
drudgery  and  obedience  to  orders. 
Everybody  is  ahead  of  him.  Just 
now  he  was  a  senior,  at  the  top  of 
a  world  he  knew  and  reigned  in,  a 
finished  product  and  pattern  of  good 

[8] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

form.     Of  a  sudden  he  is  a  novice 
again,  as  green  as  in  his  first  school 
year,  studying  a  thing  that  seems 
to  have  no  rules — at  sea  amid  cross- 
winds,    and   a   bit   seasick   withal. 
Presently,  if  he  be  made  of  stuff 
that  will  shake  into  shape  and  fit- 
ness, he  settles  to  his  tasks  and  is 
comfortable.     He  has  come  to  him- 
self:  understands  what  capacity  is, 
and  what  it  is  meant  for;   sees  that 
his  training  was  not  for  ornament 
or    personal    gratification,    but    to 
teach  him  how  to  use  himself  and 
develop      faculties      worth      using. 
Henceforth  there  is  a  zest  in  action, 
and  he  loves  to  see  his  strokes  tell. 
The  same  thing  happens  to  the 
lad  come  from  the  farm  into  the 
city,  a  big  and  novel  field,  where 
crowds  rush  and  jostle,  and  a  rustic 

2  [9] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

boy  must  stand  puzzled  for  a  little 
how  to  use  his  placid  and  unjaded 
strength.  It  happens,  too,  though 
in  a  deeper  and  more  subtle  way, 
to  the  man  who  marries  for  love,  if 
the  love  be  true  and  fit  for  foul 
weather.  Mr.  Bagehot  used  to  say 
that  a  bachelor  was  "an  amateur 
in  life,"  and  wit  and  wisdom  are 
married  in  the  jest.  A  man  who 
lives  only  for  himself  has  not  be- 
gun to  live — has  yet  to  learn  his 
use,  and  his  real  pleasure,  too,  in 
the  world.  It  is  not  necessary  he 
should  marry  to  find  himself  out, 
but  it  is  necessary  he  should  love. 
Men  have  come  to  themselves  ser- 
ving their  mothers  with  an  unselfish 
devotion,  or  their  sisters,  or  a  cause 
for  whose  sake  they  forsook  ease 
and  left  off  thinking  of  themselves. 

[10] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 
It  is  unselfish  action,  growing  slowly 
into  the  high  habit  of  devotion,  and 
at  last,  it  may  be,  into  a  sort  of 
consecration,  that  teaches  a  man 
the  wide  meaning  of  his  life,  and 
makes  of  him  a  steady  professional 
in  living,  if  the  motive  be  not 
necessity,  but  love.  Necessity  may 
make  a  mere  drudge  of  a  man,  and 
no  mere  drudge  ever  made  a  pro- 
fessional of  himself;  that  demands 
a  higher  spirit  and  a  finer  incentive 
than  his. 

ra 

Surely  a  man  has  come  to  him- 
self only  when  he  has  found  the  best 
that  is  in  him,  and  has  satisfied  his 
heart  with  the  highest  achievement 
he  is  fit  for.  It  is  only  then  that  he 
knows  of  what  he  is  capable  and 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

what  his  heart  demands.  And,  as- 
suredly, no  thoughtful  man  ever 
came  to  the  end  of  his  life,  and  had 
time  and  a  little  space  of  calm  from 
which  to  look  back  upon  it,  who  did 
not  know  and  acknowledge  that  it 
was  what  he  had  done  unselfishly 
and  for  others,  and  nothing  else, 
that  satisfied  him  in  the  retrospect, 
and  made  him  feel  that  he  had 
played  the  man.  That  alone  seems 
to  him  the  real  measure  of  himself, 
the  real  standard  of  his  manhood. 
And  so  men  grow  by  having  re- 
sponsibility laid  upon  them,  the 
burden  of  other  people's  business. 
Their  powers  are  put  out  at  in- 
terest, and  they  get  usury  in  kind. 
They  are  like  men  multiplied.  Each 
counts  manifold.  Men  who  live  with 
an  eye  only  upon  what  is  their  own 

[12] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

are  dwarfed  beside  them — seem  frac- 
tions while  they  are  integers.  The 
trustworthiness  of  men  trusted  seems 
often  to  grow  with  the  trust. 

It  is  for  this  reason  that  men  are 
in  love  with  power  and  greatness: 
it  affords  them  so  pleasurable  an 
expansion  of  faculty,  so  large  a  run 
for  their  minds,  an  exercise  of  spirit 
so  various  and  refreshing;  they  have 
the  freedom  of  so  wide  a  tract  of 
the  world  of  affairs.  But  if  they 
use  power  only  for  their  own  ends, 
if  there  be  no  unselfish  service  in  it, 
if  its  object  be  only  their  personal 
aggrandizement,  their  love  to  see 
other  men  tools  in  their  hands,  they 
go  out  of  the  world  small,  disquieted, 
beggared,  no  enlargement  of  soul 
vouchsafed  them,  no  usury  of  satis- 
faction. They  have  added  nothing 
[is] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

to  themselves.  Mental  and  physi- 
cal powers  alike  grow  by  use,  as 
every  one  knows;  but  labor  for  one- 
self alone  is  like  exercise  in  a  gym- 
nasium. No  healthy  man  can  re- 
main satisfied  with  it,  or  regard  it 
as  anything  but  a  preparation  for 
tasks  in  the  open,  amid  the  affairs 
of  the  world — not  sport,  but  busi- 
ness— where  there  is  no  orderly  ap- 
paratus, and  every  man  must  devise 
the  means  by  which  he  is  to  make 
the  most  of  himself.  To  make  the 
most  of  himself  means  the  multipli- 
cation of  his  activities,  and  he  must 
turn  away  from  himself  for  that. 
He  looks  about  him,  studies  the  face 
of  business  or  of  affairs,  catches 
some  intimation  of  their  larger  ob- 
jects, is  guided  by  the  intimation, 
and  presently  finds  himself  part  of 

[14] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

the  motive  force  of  communities  or 
of  nations.  It  makes  no  difference 
how  small  a  part,  how  insignificant, 
how  unnoticed.  When  his  powers 
begin  to  play  outward,  and  he  loves 
the  task  at  hand,  not  because  it 
gains  him  a  livelihood,  but  because 
it  makes  him  a  life,  he  has  come  to 
himself. 

Necessity  is  no  mother  to  enthu- 
siasm. Necessity  carries  a  whip.  Its 
method  is  compulsion,  not  love.  It 
has  no  thought  to  make  itself  at- 
tractive; it  is  content  to  drive. 
Enthusiasm  comes  with  the  revela- 
tion of  true  and  satisfying  objects 
of  devotion;  and  it  is  enthusiasm 
that  sets  the  powers  free.  It  is  a 
sort  of  enlightenment.  It  shines 
straight  upon  ideals,  and  for  those 

who  see  it  the  race  and  struggle  are 
[is] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

henceforth  toward  these.  An  in- 
stance will  point  the  meaning.  One 
of  the  most  distinguished  and  most 
justly  honored  of  our  great  philan- 
thropists spent  the  major  part  of  his 
life  absolutely  absorbed  in  the  mak- 
ing of  money — so  it  seemed  to  those 
who  did  not  know  him.  In  fact, 
he  had  very  early  passed  the  stage 
at  which  he  looked  upon  his  business 
as  a  means  of  support  or  of  material 
comfort.  Business  had  become  for 
him  an  intellectual  pursuit,  a  study 
in  enterprise  and  increment.  The 
field  of  commerce  lay  before  him  like 
a  chess-board;  the  moves  interested 
him  like  the  manoeuvers  of  a  game. 
More  money  was  more  power,  a 
greater  advantage  in  the  game,  the 
means  of  shaping  men  and  events 
and  markets  to  his  own  ends  and 

[16] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

uses.  It  was  his  will  that  set  fleets 
afloat  and  determined  the  havens 
they  were  bound  for;  it  was  his  fore- 
sight that  brought  goods  to  market 
at  the  right  time;  it  was  his  sug- 
gestion that  made  the  industry  of 
unthinking  men  efficacious;  his  sa- 
gacity saw  itself  justified  at  home 
not  only,  but  at  the  ends  of  the 
earth.  And  as  the  money  poured 
in,  his  government  and  mastery  in- 
creased, and  his  mind  was  the  more 
satisfied.  It  is  so  that  men  make 
little  kingdoms  for  themselves,  and 
an  international  power  undarkened 
by  diplomacy,  undirected  by  parlia- 
ments. 

IV 

It  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  the 
great  captains  of  industry,  the  great 

[17] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

organizers  and  directors  of  manu- 
facture and  commerce  and  mone- 
tary exchange,  are  engrossed  in  a 
vulgar  pursuit  of  wealth.  Too  often 
they  suffer  the  vulgarity  of  wealth 
to  display  itself  in  the  idleness  and 
ostentation  of  their  wives  and  chil- 
dren, who  "devote  themselves,"  it 
may  be,  "to  expense  regardless  of 
pleasure";  but  we  ought  not  to 
misunderstand  even  that,  or  con- 
demn it  unjustly.  The  masters  of 
industry  are  often  too  busy  with 
their  own  sober  and  momentous  call- 
ing to  have  time  or  spare  thought 
enough  to  govern  their  own  house- 
holds. A  king  may  be  too  faithful 
a  statesman  to  be  a  watchful  father. 
These  men  are  not  fascinated  by  the 
glitter  of  gold:  the  appetite  for 
power  has  got  hold  upon  them. 

[18] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

They  are  in  love  with  the  exercise 
of  their  faculties  upon  a  great  scale; 
they  are  organizing  and  overseeing 
a  great  part  of  the  life  of  the  world. 
No  wonder  they  are  captivated. 
Business  is  more  interesting  than 
pleasure,  as  Mr.  Bagehot  said,  and 
when  once  the  mind  has  caught  its 
zest,  there's  no  disengaging  it.  The 
world  has  reason  to  be  grateful  for 
the  fact. 

It  was  this  fascination  that  had 
got  hold  upon  the  faculties  of  the 
man  whom  the  world  was  afterward 
to  know,  not  as  a  prince  among  mer- 
chants— for  the  world  forgets  mer- 
chant princes — but  as  a  prince  among 
benefactors;  for  beneficence  breeds 
gratitude,  gratitude  admiration,  ad- 
miration fame,  and  the  world  re- 
members its  benefactors.  Business, 

[19] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

and  business  alone,  interested  him, 
or  seemed  to  him  worth  while.  The 
first  time  he  was  asked  to  subscribe 
money  for  a  benevolent  object  he 
declined.  Why  should  he  subscribe? 
What  affair  would  be  set  forward, 
what  increase  of  efficiency  would  the 
money  buy,  what  return  would  it 
bring  in?  Was  good  money  to  be 
simply  given  away,  like  water  pour- 
ed on  a  barren  soil,  to  be  sucked  up 
and  yield  nothing?  It  was  not  until 
men  who  understood  benevolence 
on  its  sensible,  systematic,  practical, 
and  really  helpful  side  explained  it 
to  him  as  an  investment  that  his 
mind  took  hold  of  it  and  turned  to 
it  for  satisfaction.  He  began  to  see 
that  education  was  a  thing  of  in- 
finite usury;  that  money  devoted 
to  it  would  yield  a  singular  increase 

[20] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

to  which  there  was  no  calculable 
end,  an  increase  in  perpetuity — in- 
crease of  knowledge,  and  therefore  of 
intelligence  and  efficiency,  touching 
generation  after  generation  with  new 
impulses,  adding  to  the  sum  total 
of  the  world's  fitness  for  affairs — 
an  invisible  but  intensely  real  spir- 
itual usury  beyond  reckoning,  be- 
cause compounded  in  an  unknown 
ratio  from  age  to  age.  Hencefor- 
ward beneficence  was  as  interesting 
to  him  as  business — was,  indeed,  a 
sort  of  sublimated  business  in  which 
money  moved  new  forces  in  a  com- 
merce which  no  man  could  bind  or 
limit. 

He  had  come  to  himself — to  the 
full  realization  of  his  powers,  the 
true  and  clear  perception  of  what 
it  was  his  mind  demanded  for  its 

[21] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

satisfaction.  His  faculties  were 
consciously  stretched  to  their  right 
measure,  were  at  last  exercised  at 
their  best.  He  felt  the  keen  zest, 
not  of  success  merely,  but  also  of 
honor,  and  was  raised  to  a  sort  of 
majesty  among  his  fellow-men,  who 
attended  him  in  death  like  a  dead 
sovereign.  He  had  died  dwarfed 
had  he  not  broken  the  bonds  of  mere 
money-getting;  would  never  have 
known  himself  had  he  not  learned 
how  to  spend  it;  and  ambition  it- 
self could  not  have  shown  him  a 
straighter  road  to  fame. 

This  is  the  positive  side  of  a  man's 
discovery  of  the  way  in  which  his 
faculties  are  to  be  made  to  fit  into 
the  world's  affairs,  and  released  for 
effort  in  a  way  that  will  bring  real 
satisfaction.  There  is  a  negative 
1*1 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

side  also.  Men  come  to  themselves 
by  discovering  their  limitations  no 
less  than  by  discovering  their  deep- 
er endowments  and  the  mastery 
that  will  make  them  happy.  It  is 
the  discovery  of  what  they  can  not 
do,  and  ought  not  to  attempt,  that 
transforms  reformers  into  states- 
men; and  great  should  be  the  joy 
of  the  world  over  every  reformer 
who  comes  to  himself.  The  spec- 
tacle is  not  rare;  the  method  is  not 
hidden.  The  practicability  of  every 
reform  is  determined  absolutely  and 
always  by  "the  circumstances  of  the 
case,"  and  only  those  who  put  them- 
selves into  the  midst  of  affairs,  ei- 
ther by  action  or  by  observation,  can 
know  what  those  circumstances  are 
or  perceive  what  they  signify.  No 
statesman  dreams  of  doing  whatever 

[28] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

he  pleases;  he  knows  that  it  does 
not  follow  that  because  a  point  of 
morals  or  of  policy  is  obvious  to 
him  it  will  be  obvious  to  the  nation, 
or  even  to  his  own  friends;  and  it  is 
the  strength  of  a  democratic  polity 
that  there  are  so  many  minds  to 
be  consulted  and  brought  to  agree- 
ment, and  that  nothing  can  be  wise- 
ly done  for  which  the  thought,  and 
a  good  deal  more  than  the  thought, 
of  the  country,  its  sentiment  and  its 
purpose,  have  not  been  prepared. 
Social  reform  is  a  matter  of  co- 
operation, and,  if  it  be  of  a  novel 
kind,  requires  an  infinite  deal  of  con- 
verting to  bring  the  efficient  majority 
to  believe  in  it  and  support  it.  With- 
out their  agreement  and  support  it 
is  impossible. 

[24] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 


It  is  this  that  the  more  imagina- 
tive and  impatient  reformers  find  out 
when  they  come  to  themselves,  if 
that  calming  change  ever  comes  to 
them.  Oftentimes  the  most  imme- 
diate and  drastic  means  of  bringing 
them  to  themselves  is  to  elect  them 
to  legislative  or  executive  office. 
That  will  reduce  over-sanguine  per- 
sons to  their  simplest  terms.  Not 
because  they  find  their  fellow-legis- 
lators or  officials  incapable  of  high 
purpose  or  indifferent  to  the  better- 
ment of  the  communities  which  they 
represent.  Only  cynics  hold  that 
to  be  the  chief  reason  why  we 
approach  the  millennium  so  slowly, 
and  cynics  are  usually  very  ill-in- 
formed persons.  Nor  is  it  because 

3  [25] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

under  our  modern  democratic  ar- 
rangements we  so  subdivide  power 
and  balance  parts  in  government 
that  no  one  man  can  tell  for  much 
or  turn  affairs  to  his  will.  One  of 
the  most  instructive  studies  a  poli- 
tician could  undertake  would  be  a 
study  of  the  infinite  limitations  laid 
upon  the  power  of  the  Russian  Czar, 
notwithstanding  the  despotic  theory 
of  the  Russian  constitution — limi- 
tations of  social  habit,  of  official  prej- 
udice, of  race  jealousies,  of  religious 
predilections,  of  administrative  ma- 
chinery even,  and  the  inconvenience 
of  being  himself  only  one  man, 
caught  amidst  a  rush  of  duties  and 
responsibilities  which  never  halt  or 
pause.  He  can  do  only  what  can 
be  done  with  the  Russian  people. 
He  cannot  change  them  at  will.  He 

[26] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

is  himself  of  their  own  stuff,  and 
immersed  in  the  life  which  forms 
them,  as  it  forms  him.  He  is  simply 
the  leader  of  the  Russians. 

An  English  or  American  states- 
man is  better  off.  He  leads  a  think- 
ing nation,  not  a  race  of  peasants 
topped  by  a  class  of  revolutionists 
and  a  caste  of  nobles  and  officials. 
He  can  explain  new  things  to  men 
able  to  understand,  persuade  men 
willing  and  accustomed  to  make 
independent  and  intelligent  choices 
of  their  own.  An  English  states- 
man has  an  even  better  opportunity 
to  lead  than  an  American  states- 
man, because  in  England  executive 
power  and  legislative  initiative  are 
both  intrusted  to  the  same  grand 
committee,  the  ministry  of  the  day. 
The  ministers  both  propose  what 

[27] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

shall  be  made  law  and  determine 
how  it  shall  be  enforced  when  en- 
acted. And  yet  English  reformers, 
like  American,  have  found  office  a 
veritable  cold-water  bath  for  their 
ardor  for  change.  Many  a  man 
who  has  made  his  place  in  affairs 
as  the  spokesman  of  those  who  see 
abuses  and  demand  their  reforma- 
tion has  passed  from  denunciation 
to  calm  and  moderate  advice  when 
he  got  into  Parliament,  and  has 
turned  veritable  conservative  when 
made  a  minister  of  the  crown.  Mr. 
Bright  was  a  notable  example.  Slow 
and  careful  men  had  looked  upon 
him  as  little  better  than  a  revolu- 
tionist so  long  as  his  voice  rang  free 
and  imperious  from  the  platforms 
of  public  meetings.  They  greatly 
feared  the  influence  he  should  exer- 

[28] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

else  in  Parliament,  and  would  have 
deemed  the  constitution  itself  un- 
safe could  they  have  foreseen  that 
he  would  some  day  be  invited  to 
take  office  and  a  hand  of  direction 
in  affairs.  But  it  turned  out  that 
there  was  nothing  to  fear.  Mr. 
Bright  lived  to  see  almost  every  re- 
form he  had  urged  accepted  and  em- 
bodied in  legislation;  but  he  assisted 
at  the  process  of  their  realization 
with  greater  and  greater  temper- 
ateness  and  wise  deliberation  as  his 
part  in  affairs  became  more  and  more 
prominent  and  responsible,  and  was 
at  the  last  as  little  like  an  agitator 
as  any  man  that  served  the  queen. 
It  is  not  that  such  men  lose 
courage  when  they  find  themselves 
charged  with  the  actual  direction  of 
the  affairs  concerning  which  they 

[29] 


WHEJN  A  MAJN  CUMES  TU  HIMSELF 

have  held  and  uttered  such  strong, 
unhesitating,  drastic  opinions.  They 
have  only  learned  discretion.  For 
the  first  time  they  see  in  its  entirety 
what  it  was  that  they  were  attempt- 
ing. They  are  at  last  at  close  quar- 
ters with  the  world.  Men  of  every 
interest  and  variety  crowd  about 
them;  new  impressions  throng  them; 
in  the  midst  of  affairs  the  former 
special  objects  of  their  zeal  fall  into 
new  environments,  a  better  and  truer 
perspective;  seem  no  longer  so  sus- 
ceptible to  separate  and  radical 
change.  The  real  nature  of  the 
complex  stuff  of  life  they  were  seek- 
ing to  work  in  is  revealed  to  them — 
its  intricate  and  delicate  fiber,  and 
the  subtle,  secret  interrelationship 
of  its  parts — and  they  work  circum- 
spectly, lest  they  should  mar  more 
[so] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

than  they  mend.  Moral  enthusiasm 
is  not,  uninstructed  and  of  itself,  a 
suitable  guide  to  practicable  and 
lasting  reformation;  and  if  the  re- 
form sought  be  the  reformation  of 
others  as  well  as  of  himself,  the  re- 
former should  look  to  it  that  he 
knows  the  true  relation  of  his  will 
to  the  wills  of  those  he  would  change 
and  guide.  When  he  has  discovered 
that  relation,  he  has  come  to  himself: 
has  discovered  his  real  use  and  plan- 
ning part  in  the  general  world  of 
men;  has  come  to  the  full  command 
and  satisfying  employment  of  his 
faculties.  Otherwise  he  is  doomed 
to  live  for  ever  in  a  fool's  paradise, 
and  can  be  said  to  have  come  to 
himself  only  on  the  supposition  that 
he  is  a  fool. 

[311 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

VI 

Every  man — if  I  may  adopt  and 
paraphrase  a  passage  from  Dr.  South 
— every  man  hath  both  an  absolute 
and  a  relative  capacity:  an  absolute 
in  that  he  hath  been  endued  with 
such  a  nature  and  such  parts  and 
faculties;  and  a  relative  in  that  he 
is  part  of  the  universal  community 
of  men,  and  so  stands  in  such  a  rela- 
tion to  the  whole.  When  we  say 
that  a  man  has  come  to  himself,  it 
is  not  of  his  absolute  capacity  that 
we  are  thinking,  but  of  his  relative. 
He  has  begun  to  realize  that  he  is 
part  of  a  whole,  and  to  know  what 
part,  suitable  for  what  service  and 
achievement. 

It  was  once  fashionable — and  that 
not  a  very  long  time  ago — to  speak 

[32] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

of  political  society  with  a  certain 
distaste,  as  a  necessary  evil,  an  irri- 
tating but  inevitable  restriction  upon 
the  "natural"  sovereignty  and  en- 
tire self-government  of  the  individ- 
ual. That  was  the  dream  of  the 
egotist.  It  was  a  theory  in  which 
men  were  seen  to  strut  in  the  proud 
consciousness  of  their  several  and 
"absolute"  capacities.  It  would  be 
as  instructive  as  it  would  be  difficult 
to  count  the  errors  it  has  bred  in 
political  thinking.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  men  have  never  dreamed  of 
wishing  to  do  without  the  "tram- 
mels" of  organized  society,  for  the 
very  good  reason  that  those  tram- 
mels are  in  reality  no  trammels  at 
all,  but  indispensable  aids  and  spurs 
to  the  attainment  of  the  highest  and 
most  enjoyable  things  man  is  ca- 

[38] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

pable  of.  Political  society,  the  life 
of  men  in  states,  is  an  abiding 
natural  relationship.  It  is  neither  a 
mere  convenience  nor  a  mere  neces- 
sity. It  is  not  a  mere  voluntary  as- 
sociation, not  a  mere  corporation. 
It  is  nothing  deliberate  or  artificial, 
devised  for  a  special  purpose.  It  is 
in  real  truth  the  eternal  and  natu- 
ral expression  and  embodiment  of  a 
form  of  life  higher  than  that  of  the 
individual — that  common  life  of  mu- 
tual helpfulness,  stimulation,  and 
contest  which  gives  leave  and  op- 
portunity to  the  individual  life, 
makes  it  possible,  makes  it  full  and 
complete. 

It  is  in  such  a  scene  that  man 
looks  about  to  discover  his  own 
place  and  force.  In  the  midst 
of  men  organized,  infinitely  cross- 

[34] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

related,  bound  by  ties  of  interest, 
hope,  affection,  subject  to  authori- 
ties, to  opinion,  to  passion,  to  visions 
and  desires  which  no  man  can  reckon, 
he  casts  eagerly  about  to  find  where 
he  may  enter  in  with  the  rest  and  be 
a  man  among  his  fellows.  In  mak- 
ing his  place  he  finds,  if  he  seek  in- 
telligently and  with  eyes  that  see, 
more  than  ease  of  spirit  and  scope 
for  his  mind.  He  finds  himself — 
as  if  mists  had  cleared  away  about 
him  and  he  knew  at  last  his  neigh- 
borhood among  men  and  tasks. 

What  every  man  seeks  is  satis- 
faction. He  deceives  himself  so  long 
as  he  imagines  it  to  lie  in  self- 
indulgence,  so  long  a  she  deems  him- 
self the  center  and  object  of  effort. 
His  mind  is  spent  in  vain  upon  it- 
self. Not  in  action  itself,  not  in 

135] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

"pleasure,"  shall  it  find  its  desires 
satisfied,    but    in    consciousness    of 
right,  of  powers  greatly  and  nobly 
spent.     It  comes  to  know  itself  in 
the  motives  which  satisfy  it,  in  the 
zest  and  power  of  rectitude.     Chris- 
tianity has  liberated  the  world,  not 
as  a  system  of  ethics,  not  as  a  phi- 
losophy of  altruism,  but  by  its  rev- 
elation of  the  power  of   pure   and 
unselfish  love.     Its  vital  principle  is 
not  its  code,  but  its  motive.    Love, 
clear-sighted,  loyal,  personal,  is  its 
breath     and     immortality.     Christ 
came,  not  to  save  Himself,  assuredly, 
but  to  save  the  world.    His  motive, 
His  example,  are  every  man's  key  to 
his  own  gifts  and  happiness.     The 
ethical  code  he  taught  may  no  doubt 
be  matched,  here  a  piece  and  there 
a  piece,  out  of  other  religions,  other 

[36] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 

teachings  and  philosophies.  Every 
thoughtful  man  born  with  a  con- 
science must  know  a  code  of  right 
and  of  pity  to  which  he  ought  to 
conform;  but  without  the  motive 
of  Christianity,  without  love,  he 
may  be  the  purest  altruist  and  yet 
be  as  sad  and  as  unsatisfied  as  Mar- 
cus Aurelius. 

Christianity  gave  us,  in  the  full- 
ness of  time,  the  perfect  image  of 
right  living,  the  secret  of  social  and 
of  individual  well-being;  for  the  two 
are  not  separable,  and  the  man  who 
receives  and  verifies  that  secret  in 
his  own  living  has  discovered  not 
only  the  best  and  only  way  to  serve 
the  world,  but  also  the  one  happy 
way  to  satisfy  himself.  Then,  in- 
deed, has  he  come  to  himself.  Hence- 
forth he  knows  what  his  powers 

[37] 


WHEN  A  MAN  COMES  TO  HIMSELF 
mean,  what  spiritual  air  they  breathe, 
what  ardors  of  service  clear  them 
of  lethargy,  relieve  them  of  all  sense 
of  effort,  put  them  at  their  best. 
After  this  fretfulness  passes  away, 
experience  mellows  and  strengthens 
and  makes  more  fit,  and  old  age 
brings,  not  senility,  not  satiety,  not 
regret,  but  higher  hope  and  serene 
maturity. 


THE   END 


54774 


DATE  DUE 


6  'imp 

APR 

1976 

RF(!p  i 

MR    \t>s     1Q7f 

Ppll  { 

Jg 

DP  U    I 

J  \J    \      (•  J    M     1  « 

GAYLORD 

PRINTED  IN  U.S.A. 

..,U.£,f.?.U™E!?N.  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


A     000  847  029     6 


